Education, Training & Achievement Scores

Aptitude, Achievement & Intelligence Scores

The NLSY79 Child surveys contain a wide range of detailed assessment information about the children of female respondents. Since 1986, a battery of child cognitive, socio-emotional, and physiological assessments has been administered biennially for age appropriate children. Assessments related to aptitude, achievement, and cognitive ability are listed below. Each individual assessment is discussed in more detail in the Assessments section of the topical guide. Users may also wish to review the Introduction to the Assessments section, which contains general information about the administration of the child assessments.

Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test-Revised (PPVT-R), Form L - (American Guidance Service), a wide-range test used to measure the hearing vocabulary knowledge of children whose PPVT age is three and above. Administered to children age 4 and 5 or 10 and 11 starting with the 1996 survey round.

Parts of the Body - ten items, developed by Kagan, that measure the ability of children aged one or two to identify various parts of their bodies. This assessment was not administered after 1988.

Memory for Locations - an assessment, developed by Kagan, that measures the ability of children eight months of age through three years to remember the location of an object which is subsequently hidden from view. This assessment was not used after 1988.

Verbal Memory - a subtest of the McCarthy Scales of Children's Abilities (Psychological Corporation) that assesses short-term verbal memory of children aged three through six years to remember words, sentences, or major concepts from a short story. Part C, the story, was not used after the 1990 survey. This assessment was not administered after 1994.

Memory for Digit Span - a component of the revised Wechsler Intelligence Scales for Children (Psychological Corporation) which assesses the ability of children seven through eleven years of age to remember and repeat numbers sequentially in forward and reverse order.